The Convert
by fetch-thranduilion
Summary: Raistlin is always so inconsiderate. He went and changed allegiances without wondering what his patron goddess might think...Lunitari POV


Fetchie's writing angst! AAAAUUUGGGGHHHHH! In first person! AAAAUUUUUGGHHHH! Run while you still can! Hopefully when Dark Chronicles comes out this whole matter will be resolved once and for all and I can take this story down (thank Paladine). Until then…visit my forum and read…if you dare. And if you're really nuts (or know me personally) you can visit my Xanga, where I have a picture loosely based on this posted.

Sorry if Luni is a little OOC…this is a pet theory of mine…but let me make one thing clear: I_ don't_ think she's "in love" with him, per se.

I also don't own Lunitari or Astinus or Nuitari, and Raistlin of course will not tolerate being owned by anyone (in either sense of the word.)

"The Convert"

Silver, black, and red moonlight poured through the windows of the room. The night was silent, as if it knew what had just occurred. As if all creation was aware that somewhere in the darkness, a young man walked under the guidance of a new sponsor.

Standing in the red moonlight, light my body absorbed and reflected for I was the cause of it, I held what I had found on the floor in my hands and wondered frantically: _How could this have happened?_ I thought these robes would never be discarded, but apparently he had had other plans, and now wore something that blended into a crowd far easier than scarlet.

I'd known for quite some time that I was overpossessive of him, that I should not be, but I could not help myself. As the magic I gave him was his ecstasy, so to me was the worship and love of the magic I received in return. I was proud that such a man bowed to me, proud to have him in my service, proud of his powers. Yes, there were times I had influenced his life a little to ensure that worship continued. Perhaps I _had_ shone a little brighter the night he discovered the unfaithfulness of that girl whose claims threatened to make him forget his calling's glory. I was, after all, his patron. It was my duty to point out dangers.

He had broken his trust as my vassal, though, and I had to know why. No, I already did. Still clutching the red robes, I went to pay a visit to my father.

"Explain this." I tossed the robes down on the book in which my father was attempting to write. In return, I was given a scowl of irritation.

"I do not believe it necessary. That bargain was made long ago. A regrettable decision on the young man's part, but nothing we can do anything about, least of all now." Shoving the robes back in my hands, he continued his writing as if I had never interrupted it. "Now go away. You're disturbing my work."

I am not usually annoyed; I laugh more than I frown, understanding most of the inner workings behind the actions of others. Yet tonight was not a night for understanding, at least, not of that ilk.

"He left me. You helped him leave me."

My accusation made no mark on my father's marble face. "He made his own decision. That, I believe, is one of the key joys and sorrows of neutrality, which we both, as it so happens, embody. As such, if there is blame to be had in this situation, when it falls on my shoulders it has been sorely misplaced."

"Don't give me that self-righteous twaddle," I snapped, in a mood so foul even I was beginning to dislike myself. "You were there when the bargain was finalized. And you did nothing, even though you knew what this would mean to the world. To me!"

"That is the problem with being a child of the magic," he stated flatly. "You think you have the power to do whatever you want. As a goddess of the arcane, that power is yours to command. As a goddess under me—it can never be, lest everything we tell our followers becomes a lie. We most of all the gods cannot, must not shape or bend the free will of our servants, for we are the protectors of that free will. You are bound to honor his decision by your very nature."

I knew the argument was solid, knew it within myself before he'd spoken. Yet I willed there to be a crack in it somewhere. "But it was not of his own free will! My cousin's lich stole him, tricked him!"

"The bargain was his own choice."

"He tried to rescind it! He didn't want it!"

"And it was Fistandantilus's choice to honor the pact anyway. You can't grant free will to one person because you like them and deny it to everyone else."

"You made a mistake," I interjected, trying to steer the conversation back to the reason I had come. "You told him the Key. That's why he did what he did. That's why I found these—" I shook the robes at him, sending a wave of rose-flavored air wafting through the room "—lying like a puddle of blood in my light this evening!"

"Another fault of the magi. Requiring perfection in their spellcasting, they expect that same perfection in everyone they meet." He returned to his writing, and I wondered if this meeting would be recorded.

Apparently to him, the conversation had ended. I stayed there, though, with the calls and pleas of countless mages coursing through my head. Jenna, Justarius…they trusted me, believed in me, and I in turn was buoyed by their faith. It was true; I _did_ favor the independent ones, forging their own road through the slag of existence, so I could not in integrity manipulate any of them for my own desires. But as they called to me, and I answered their calls silently, I strained to hear the one voice that likely would never again seek my aid. He, like the demon before him—I would not accord that creature the term "man"—abandoned me and went forth to meet his doom.

For how else could it end? I knew where his descent would lead him, and history would repeat. He'd come to know how it had ended the first time, but he would not care. _It will not end that way for me, _he would say,_ because I am different. I am stronger. Nothing stands in my way that, with perseverance, I cannot overcome._

His self-reliance had long ago earned my respect, even as he conceded that his power came from elsewhere and he had to seek my aid from time to time. But his pleas never took the form so many resorted to; he never said "Let the spell work" or "Make this happen". He always said "Let _me_ accomplish this task." Though he would never admit it, he had his own Measure that rivaled the Knights he and I both disdained. He would be indebted to no one, paid his debts in full. He fought his own battles. I gave him the strength; he gave me the worship I'd come to adore, coming from a mortal who would not bear thralldom in any other form.

Yet now he was an unwitting half-slave. No, unwitting he was not. The sound of the quill pen, scraping across the parchment, reminded me with sickening force of that. Oh, he knew. But I was not sure if he would fight it. He also had a nasty habit of pointedly ignoring things he could do to benefit himself in the long term in order to serve more immediate, ambitious goals, odd in one whose worldview could be so broad. It was the flip side of the passion, of the drive. He could not exist, showing one trait without the other. Light and darkness, good and evil. With me, as always, in the middle.

From that point I could embrace—or detest—both. The man before me, still pointedly ignoring my continued presence in his study, was right. My champion—for that was what he had been, all along, since his first trial—had displayed the free will for which I had knighted him. His life was his own, and he chose for his allegiance to end.

Slowly I let the red robes in my hands slip and fall to the floor. Then I faded, leaving the impassive librarian to his impassive recordings of the fiercely passionate world. Returning to my place beside my cousins, I saw him whom I had lost staring upwards. Nuitari in particular lingered in his gaze; no doubt he was now marveling in his new power, seeing the unseen at last.

His glance, however, also seemed to rest on me a bit, with a loyalty I tried to convince myself I imagined, letting him go as I had let go the garments he had abandoned. Yet—the flip side of the coin again—there was another way to view his choice, another factor to be taken into consideration.

_I will trust in you,_ I told the convert below without speaking, not even really wanting him to hear. _You will find life under that dark boot stifling. Nuitari is a god who values his own independence yet expects his followers to do his bidding. (How close I had come to being the same! Yet I did not need to be.) You are strong. You will break free. I need not try to win you back._

_You will return on your own._


End file.
